


I Think I Just Blacked Out

by Telanu



Category: Grace and Frankie (TV)
Genre: F/F, Fluff and Angst, Misunderstandings, Older Characters, POV Outsider, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-03
Updated: 2017-04-03
Packaged: 2018-10-14 07:34:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10531839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telanu/pseuds/Telanu
Summary: Grace and Frankie enlist Brianna’s help. If only she could figure out what the hell for.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Contains spoilers for all three seasons.
> 
> Thanks to Luthien for the wonderful beta!

 

Frankie never looked nervous, but today she was tugging on her agate necklace, and Brianna knew damn well that if she tugged too hard, the necklace would either: a) break, or b) make her slip a disc.

Maybe she just felt out of place. Frankie was no stranger to chi-chi restaurants or bistros, but there was only one vegan item on this place’s menu, and nobody else here was wearing anything made from hemp. Normally Frankie didn’t give a fuck about fitting in anywhere (as she liked to remind everybody, and often), but something about this afternoon felt a little bit...off.

Best to get straight to the point. “So,” Brianna said, sipping her Bloody Mary, “what’s so important about this lunch that I had to cancel the trip I was going to make to Fashion Valley Mall? I was looking forward to the people in Hermes trying to smile at me. It’s like watching someone sprain their face.” 

She’d expected Frankie to reply with something about murdering cows in the name of fashionable handbags, or exploiting overworked silkworms for scarves. Instead, Frankie kept tugging on her necklace and said, “Oh. You should have said something. We could have rescheduled. Next week, maybe. Or next month.” Her eyes slid to the left. “I’m pretty open next year…”

“Frankie, what the hell.” Brianna wrinkled her nose and went for the most likely explanation. “Does this have anything to do with Mom? Are you guys fighting again?”

“Fighting? No, we’re not fighting!” Frankie’s laugh was a little unsteady, and she still wasn’t looking Brianna in the eye. The last time she’d looked this furtive was when she’d almost been caught smuggling a juvenile ball python across the state border “because he was going to be _cowboy boots,_ Grace.”  

“But it is something to do with Mom,” Brianna pressed.

“Well...yeah. But it’s nothing bad. It’s something pretty cool, actually. We were trying to figure out which one of us should talk to you, and I lost...I mean, I won the coin toss.”

“Whatever it is, why couldn’t you both talk to me? Besides, if Mom was here, she’d pay for all our food.” As it was, Brianna was going to treat, because Frankie was always treated.

“Both of us?” Frankie looked comically horrified. “At the same time? Oh God, no. I’ve been in that movie, and I don’t like how the credits roll.”

“Um,” Brianna said. Then she gave up. “Right, that makes total sense.”

“And we decided to tell you first, because we figured after that, the rest would be easy.”

“The rest would be…” Brianna sat up very straight in her chair. “Is somebody sick? Like, terminal? Because you know I’d only be worried if it was terminal.” Frankie had a lesion on her brain from a previous stroke. Could that kind of thing...grow? Was it like a tumor? Because Frankie having a brain tumor would explain a whole hell of a lot, but it wouldn’t exactly be a welcome development.

“No, no, nobody’s sick,” Frankie said, following up with a little _why-would-you-even-think-that_ laugh. “I told you, it’s cool. Icebox cool. Cucumber cool. Cucumber _in_ an icebox cool. And if you’re cool too, we’re kind of hoping you can help us out.”

“Help out with _what?”_

Frankie bit her lip. Then she folded her hands on the table, almost landing them in her cauliflower casserole, and straightened her back. “Right. Here goes. Your mom and I are taking business to the next level. And we’re really happy about it. And if you’re not happy, then do me a favor and fake it until you get home.”

What the hell? When Frankie didn’t elaborate further, Brianna shrugged and said, “I think that’s great. Why would I have a problem with it?”

Vybrant had been kicking ass these last couple of years. You couldn’t find the products in chain stores yet, but Mom and Frankie’s old lady vibrators and easy-open condoms were for sale in pretty much every co-op and natural foods store west of I-95. And there were a _lot_ of those. It made sense that Mom and Frankie would want to build on that momentum.

Frankie was gaping at her. She shook her head. Her turquoise earrings swayed. “Problem? I mean, of course there’s not--it’s great?" 

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Brianna tilted her head to the side. “It’s not exactly a shocker. You guys have been heading that way for a while.” 

Frankie blinked. “That’s exactly what she said. More or less. Kind of.”

“So it was her idea.”

“Totally!” Frankie yanked on the necklace again, her eyes going wide, as if in remembered astonishment. “Can you believe it? I was practically knocked on my ass!”

Brianna finished up the Bloody Mary instead of pointing out that Mom was the one with the business acumen and the instincts of a killer. If her most recent executive decision came as such a surprise to Frankie, then it was probably a brilliant one. She said, “I guess you’re with her on it, though.”

“Well, duh. How would it even work if I wasn’t?” Frankie leaned across the table. Her sleeve dragged against the cheddar cheese on top of her cauliflower. Her eyes were clear now, and so was her brow, and her lips were stretching into her broadest grin. What did she have to be so relieved about? “This is great. Thank you so much, Brianna. I really thought this would be--well, sorry about that. I underestimated you. Now the real question is, would you mind helping us out with planning some of the details? You’re so good at that stuff." 

That was a little weird. Ever since Brianna had given Vybrant a secret loan two years ago, Mom had been touchy about letting her be involved with the business. Something was up.

She narrowed her eyes. “Frankie, are you sure Mom is okay with you and me having this conversation?”

Frankie seemed to bristle. “Of course! I told you about the coin toss, and I wouldn’t fuck around about a coin toss, Brianna." 

“True,” Brianna acknowledged.

“She was pretty stoked when it was me, honestly. I mean, I’m guessing that’s what the ‘hallelujah’ was about.” 

“How did you lose a coin toss?” Frankie’s collection of double-sided coins was something she planned to leave to a museum when the time came.

Frankie made a face. “She’s onto me. Double-checked when she got a dime out of her coin purse and saw I’d replaced them all. She scavenged some loose change from the couch.”

“Surprised it took this long. What specifically am I helping you with?” And how hard would it be to wiggle out of most of it? And what about it could be such a big deal that Frankie had seemed so nervous at first?

“Oh--well--your mom’ll have most of that all lined up, honestly. You know she’s the one for organizing. I was just here to break the news. She said if you were cool with it, then maybe you could stop by for breakfast tomorrow.”

Brianna weighed the sacredness of sleeping in on Sunday against Mom’s flawless pancakes and made her decision. “Grade B maple syrup, right?”

Frankie beamed. “You got it. I can fill you in on the general concept, though.”

 _Brace yourself._ Frankie’s general concepts could encompass the known universe, and a fair bit of the unknown universe as well. “Oh yeah?”

“A celebration of femininity! Obviously!” Frankie leaned back against her chair, her smile growing ever wider. She raised her gaze--along with her hands--to the air. “Letting a plant that was stifled by darkness be nourished by new light. It’s time to embrace the goddess within.”

The last one sounded like a good tagline for Vybrant. Brianna wasn’t going to touch the other, awful one. She nodded and hoped she was keeping a straight face. “Mom’s a fan of that language?”

Frankie gave her an exasperated look. “Not _yet,_ she isn’t. But give me time and I’ll get her on board.”

“Right. Sure you will.”

Frankie wagged her finger. “I heard that doubt in your voice, Doubting Thomasina. Which was the name of a band I almost started,” she added reflectively. “Our ethos was supposed to be ‘blasphemy,’ but it just never happened. Aren’t you gonna take notes on this?”

Brianna pulled out her phone. “Sure thing, right now,” she said as she opened up the text app and prepared to send Barry a few nudes. “Okay...go.”

She made sure to nod and hum from time to time, and caught a few keywords like “destiny” and “earth mothers” and “the sacred joining of hands.” Finally, after she’d sent the photo where she’d posed like Marilyn Monroe in _Playboy_ , she caught “la vita nueva.” 

“Nuova,” she said, dropping her phone back into her purse. “It’s _La Vita Nuova._ ”

Frankie waved her hand. “I was high during most of French. You got all that?"

“Yep.” Hopefully Barry had already popped a boner. “Earth mothers, joining hands, all that good stuff.”

Frankie nodded seriously. “And I’m thinking goats.”

Okay. Brianna might have missed something pivotal there, but Mom would fill her in tomorrow. “When are you not thinking about goats?”

“I laugh too hard when I think about the fainting ones, and then I have to stop. I’ve also suggested honeybees, but she’s resisting.”

Maybe Frankie was trying to come up with a new planet-friendly preservative for lube. Or maybe this was just more of her worries about colony collapse. “Go figure. Can’t wait to hear her side of it tomorrow,” Brianna said. On the plus side, Mom would tell Brianna what the fuck was going on. On the debit side, Mom would check to make sure Brianna was actually writing stuff down.

“She’ll be so happy to see you, sweetheart.” Frankie reached across the table and took Brianna’s hand. “You won’t be able to tell, of course, but happiness will be present. Inside.” She paused. “Very deep inside.”

Brianna judged it was safe to squeeze Frankie’s hand. She was sober and wouldn’t try to turn it into a thumb war. “Well, Mom’s been as happy as I’ve ever known her to be these last few years. I know a lot of that--okay, most of that--okay, all of that--is to do with you. We’re all grateful.”

So, so, so grateful. Mom hadn’t mentioned starting a book club in ages. In fact, it had been a long time since she’d called Brianna, or since they’d talked at all. She and Frankie had been keeping themselves to themselves these last few...weeks? It really had been weeks, hadn’t it? God knew what kind of trouble they’d gotten themselves into when left unattended for so long. Could Frankie actually have talked Mom into buying that ostrich farm?

Frankie leaned forward again. This time, she wore a sly grin, and she waggled her eyebrows. “Yeah, well, maybe I can’t take _all_ the credit. But let me just say...your mom’s collar is popped higher than ever these days.”  

Brianna blinked. Then she closed her eyes. “Please don't say--”

“Metaphorically,” Frankie added.

Yeah, there had been no stopping that. Whatever. The question now was: Barry or Hermes? She couldn’t have both, because he didn’t like going to the mall with her. He was weird about having sex in dressing rooms.

“Okay,” she said, flagging down the server for the check.

“Most def. So fresh.” Frankie stopped beaming when she caught sight of her cheesy sleeve. “Damn it. Do you have any dish soap on you?”

Hermes. Definitely Hermes.

 

* * *

 

 

As it happened, Mom’s happiness wasn’t locked deep down inside the next morning. It was on full display as she flung open the door and wrapped Brianna in a bear hug without saying a word.

Neither did Brianna. She stood still without putting her arms around her mother, holding a bottle of cold champagne in one hand and a gift bag in the other, and looked up in puzzlement at the top of the door.

“Uh, morning,” she said. 

Mom pulled back and wore the most radiant smile Brianna had seen on her face in, well, maybe _ever?_ She glowed in a peach-colored blouse with (it was true) a collar that was popped high even for her, gold jewelry, and perfectly fitted dark blue jeans. And, of course, nude heels. It was Grace Hanson’s idea of casual weekend morning wear, and Brianna had known this for years, so why did it seem different today? Had Vybrant pulled in ten million dollars overnight or something?

And what the hell had Brianna gotten herself into by agreeing to “help with the details”?

Mom saw the bottle of champagne, and for a second, it honest-to-God looked like she had tears in her eyes. “Oh!” she said, putting a hand on her chest. “Brianna, you didn’t have to. We have some, of course.”

“Well, it seems like a celebration is called for,” Brianna said, injecting a suitable amount of pep into her voice. She held up the gift bag, too. “Big things are happening, huh?”

“The biggest. Can you even believe it?” Mom took hold of the champagne and looked at the label. She laughed softly. “Who’d have ever thought we’d end up here?”

 _Where, exactly, is “here”?_ Was what Brianna didn’t have time to say before Mom pivoted on her high heels and marched back into the house toward the kitchen. She’d ignored the gift bag completely. Joke was on her, since it held a bottle of Grey Goose and a jar of Spanish olives.

The kitchen already smelled heavenly. Coffee was brewing, Jamaica Blue Mountain if Brianna was any judge, and the scent of frying pancake batter wafted across the room. The table was already set. The napkins had been tied into little bows. There was a color scheme of green and blue. Even for Mom, this was a little over-the-top for Sunday brunch for three.

Brianna looked over it and then gave her mother a quizzical glance. Mom shrugged sheepishly. “This is kind of a dry run. With lower stakes.” She picked up her spatula and expertly flipped over a pancake. “We want to have everyone here soon, of course.”

Presumably “everyone” meant their family. The news must be super big if the stakes were “high” for a gathering of the Hanson-Bergstein circus.

Then Mom gave Brianna a quick look. “You didn’t tell anybody, did you? I assume not, since I haven’t been getting any phone calls. Frankie said she swore you to silence, but she couldn’t look me in the eye, so I’m pretty sure she forgot.”

If Frankie had, in fact, sworn Brianna to silence, then Brianna had missed it completely. She felt like she’d missed a lot of things. “She didn’t forget. My lips are sealed. Promise.”

“Whew. Thank goodness. I think it really is better if we spread the word ourselves." 

“ _Definitely_ better.” Okay, so Brianna had to whittle this down before Mom realized she was clueless. There could be only one thing on the plate for Vybrant that could be _this_ earth-shaking. And if Brianna was wrong, then she’d find a way to blame it on Frankie.

“So,” she said, setting her gift bag on the counter, “wow. You’re going public.”

That’d be beyond big. It’d be huge. Vybrant, a publicly traded company on the NYSE? Mom and Frankie’s whole operation would change. Over the years, they’d developed quite the team of employees--once, Frankie had actually referred to herself as a CEO before admitting she felt like a traitor. But going public was a huge step.

Mom chuckled as she flipped another pancake. Were her cheeks a little pink? It must be warm over the stove. “Yeah. ‘Wow’ is right. We’ve been talking about it for a while, but…”

Brianna had to admit, being smug felt great when you were right about something. She gave herself a mental pat on the back. “A while? How long?”

It couldn’t be too long. Frankie was the worst at keeping secrets. Maybe that was why she and Mom had been keeping such a low profile for the last few weeks. The minute Frankie met somebody’s eyes, she’d blurt, “Oh my God! We’re going public! I don’t even know what that means!”

But to Brianna’s shock, Mom said, “Oh...the whole thing started maybe six months or so ago. We can talk about it when Frankie gets here. But _this_ ” --she gestured at the bottle of champagne-- “I’ve been working on for the last month before Frankie finally saw sense.”

“Saw sense?”

“Yeah, you know.” Mom rolled her eyes. “‘The patriarchy’ and ‘the system’ and all that. Why do we have to have it _legitimized,_ why can’t we just…” She waved the spatula. “Well, you get the picture.”

For sure. Frankie had undoubtedly been picturing the floor of the NYSE bursting with white men in suits, working for other white men in suits who ran the world. She hated it. Maybe Mom had convinced her they could destroy “the system” better from within.

“Picture gotten,” Brianna said.

“Speaking of Frankie getting here,” Mom muttered. She opened the junk drawer and pulled out her walkie-talkie before mashing the button with her thumb. “Frankie? Are you there? Brianna’s here.”

There was a pause. Mom sighed, and then growled, “Chicken Coop, this is B2B, do you read me?”

Brianna didn’t even bother hiding her grin. Mom glared at her, but her lips twitched.  

Frankie’s static-fuzzed voice immediately replied, _“Affirmative, B2B. Give me five minutes. I’m washing my brushes.”_

“Well, don’t take too long. The champagne’s getting warm.” Mom winked at Brianna. Mom...winked. At Brianna.

_“Got it. Will do. Chicken Coop out!”_

“‘B2B’?” Brianna asked, as yet another deeply weird detail of Mom and Frankie’s deeply weird life pinged in her memory. “I thought you had a different handle.”

Mom cleared her throat and put the walkie-talkie back in the drawer. “Frankie refused to answer unless I started using it. Thinks it’s cute. She’s lucky I’m willing to use a _handle_ at all.”

“Does it mean anything?”

Mom raised an eyebrow. “ _I’m_ not saying it. You’re smart. It’ll come to you in a second.” She sighed. “Feel free to laugh.”

“I, uh, always do,” Brianna said. If it didn’t “come to her in a second,” then she’d wait a few minutes, clap her hands, and laugh like she’d gotten it. “So when’s the IPO?”

For a second, Mom’s brow wrinkled, as if in confusion. Then it cleared, and she chuckled. “I like that one. Not bad. Well, we don’t want anything over-the-top, so there’s no need to wait too long.” She made a sour face. “At our age, ‘too long’ is a lot shorter than it is for you. Frankly, I’d rather not wait anymore at all. It’s been--” Now she looked almost apprehensive as she glanced at Brianna again. “We’ve waited long enough already. I’m trying to convince her that it doesn’t have to be too complicated.”

That was pure Grace Hanson: do things the proper way, but avoid wasting any time. Brianna honestly had no idea how long it took to get ready for this kind of thing, but Mom had clearly looked into it. “I’m not sure she’s been listening. She seems to have some pretty complicated ideas.”

Mom grimaced. “Oh, no. Did she mention the goats?”

“Duh. Though I honestly can’t imagine how goats could have anything to do with this, it’s still pure Frankie.”

“Unadulterated.” Mom’s smile became fond.

Brianna couldn’t resist adding, “And bees.”

Mom’s eyes widened. The smile disappeared. She slammed the spatula on the counter. _“No bees.”_

“Maybe she meant wasps, in honor of you.”

“Very funny.” Mom began to slide the perfectly golden-brown pancakes onto a large platter. Brianna saw with gratification that a bottle of Grade B maple syrup sat on the table. “I swear. She fought me for so long, but once she gives in, it’s with total enthusiasm. You should see our Pinterest board.”

Brianna blinked. She followed Vybrant’s board, and nothing unusual had been appearing on it recently. In fact, she was pretty sure Mom refused to let Frankie have the password. They’d hired somebody specifically to take care of their company’s social media presence. More to the point…

“Um, doesn’t this seem like kind of an odd thing to put on a Pinterest board?” she asked. How would you even do it? Were there cute recipes and home decorations for stock offerings?

Mom blinked too. “Are you serious? Sometimes I think that’s the only thing that’s _on_ Pinterest. The search results are just--”

“Companies going public is a top result on Pinterest?” Brianna blurted, knowing even as the words came out of her mouth that something had gone completely haywire.

“--overwhelming unless you narrow the keywords--” Mom stopped.

She stared at Brianna. Brianna stared back.

“What did you say?” Mom asked.

“I...um…” Brianna took a deep breath and raised one index finger into the air, though she wasn’t sure why, just that it was a thing to do, and might serve to point blame at the ceiling. “It’s possible I might be misunderstanding what’s going on here. What are you talking about?”

“What are _you_ talking about?” The pink flush had died from Mom’s cheeks. Now she was going pale. “Misunderstanding? Brianna--what exactly do you think is going on?”

Shit, shit, shit. Maybe Mallory would call and say all four of her kids were in the hospital at once. “Um...I thought Frankie said...I mean, _you_ just said you’re taking the company public. Right?”

“I most certainly did not! We’re not--Frankie said that?”

“Uh...not in so many words. But based on what she said, I--”

“Brianna!” Mom held up a hand that looked like it was trembling a little. “What exactly did Frankie say? And believe me, I am sure there were so many words.”

Brianna squinted and tried to remember. “She said, um...oh! She said you guys were taking business to the next level.”

Mom’s breath left her in a whoosh. She leaned back against the counter with her mouth open, obviously thunderstruck.

“And then she said if I wasn’t happy about it, I had to fake it. So I assumed--”

“That’s all she said? Business to the next--?”

Brianna squirmed and looked longingly at the gift bag with the Grey Goose. “She, um, said some other stuff too. I might not have paid the closest attention, because--”

Mom’s eyes widened in obvious outrage.

“ _Because_ I knew I was coming to see you today, and you’d explain everything in a way I could actually understand!” Brianna clasped her hands over her chest, and decided to add, “Mommy.”

“Don’t ‘Mommy’ me, I can’t believe--” Mom stopped and smacked her palms against the countertop before storming to the back door that led down the stairs to Frankie’s studio. Instead of bothering with the walkie-talkie, she flung the door wide open and bellowed, “ _Frankie!_ Get the _hell_ in here!”

Then she glanced back over her shoulder at Brianna, who stood frozen at the kitchen island, and said, “No, forget that. I’ll-- _we’ll_ be right back.” She put one foot out of the back door, but before the rest of her went, her brow puckered, and she looked at Brianna with an expression of disbelief. “Even if she didn’t tell you, you really couldn’t figure it out on your own?”

At the disdain in Mom’s voice, Brianna was suddenly ten years old once more. An eight-year-old Mallory stood by her side, both of them knowing that, yet again, they had fallen short of their mother’s standards. Any second now, Mom would sigh, shake her head, and tell them to go upstairs and finish their homework.

Brianna fought not to hang her head and shuffle her feet. Before she could say anything--something defensive, or something smart-assed, she never knew until the words came out of her mouth--Mom pointed at the refrigerator. She snapped, _“Seriously?”_

Then she stomped out of the kitchen. The door banged shut behind her.

Brianna exhaled a breath that was much shakier than she’d like. Ninety-nine percent of the time, she went toe-to-toe with Mom without a problem. It was that one percent when she got KO’d in the first round, and it always left her reeling for a second. The worst part was that Mom never even noticed.

Apparently there was something Brianna hadn’t noticed, either. Something important. And it had something to do with the refrigerator. She shook her head, told herself to get her shit together, and went to look at the stainless steel doors.

It was nothing she hadn’t seen before. A daily to-do list, the chore schedule: Mom’s. Magnets with either images of the Buddha or dirty double entendres: Frankie’s. There was a new one today--it read “Save a Tree, Eat a Beaver." 

Brianna snorted. She could imagine Frankie’s wide-eyed look of innocence when Mom spluttered. _Trees matter, Grace._ And, of course, it had worked. 

There were a couple of photos, too. That had come as a surprise. Nothing had ever been stuck to the fridge when Brianna was a kid. No photographs, no drawings from her and Mallory. Both Mom and Dad thought it was tacky. Of course, the Bergstein fridge had been covered with everything (and full of worse). You could barely see the doors. At least this seemed like kind of a reasonable compromise.

Brianna looked over the pictures. There was the one from two Julys ago, when the whole family had taken a trip up to Crater Lake. It was just your standard family photo taken by a generous stranger, nothing unusual about it. There was another one of Frankie standing proudly next to the entrance of an exotic animal rescue after she’d handed over the python.

And then there was the relatively recent one of Mom sitting on the beach from when she and Frankie had gone to Santa Monica for a weekend. That would have been, what, six months ago now?

Brianna blinked. Six months. Late May. What had Mom just said? _The whole thing started maybe six months ago or so._ What “whole thing”?

She unclipped the photo from the magnet and frowned at it, looking closely at it for the first time. They’d had a crazy hot summer. In late May, it had been warm enough for Mom to be wearing a swimsuit, an elegant black maillot that she wouldn’t take into the water in a million years. She had a filmy white wrap on and was sitting on a beach towel with her arms around her knees, leaning forward, her mouth wide with a smile--a real smile, not the close-lipped one she trotted out for posed photos. Her hair was whipped by the wind. Her eyes were shining at the camera.

No. Not at the camera. At the person taking the picture.

She wasn’t bothering with a dignified pose, or making sure that her head was at the best angle to hide the wrinkles on her neck. She was just sitting on a beach towel, eyes shining, and there were no photos of Grace Hanson like this, none. And that smile? Now that she really looked, Brianna couldn’t remember seeing that smile in a long time, if ever. Combined with the way Mom was hugging her knees and tilting her head, it looked almost...shy. Like Mom was saying, _Okay. Just this once. And only because it’s you._

Her heart beating harder than it should, Brianna flipped over the picture. In Frankie’s scrawl were the letters _ICU,_ followed by a smiley face that had its tongue saucily sticking out.

“ICU?” Brianna said, and as she heard herself say it, she knew it had nothing to do with an Intensive Care Unit. She repeated softly, breathlessly, “I see you.”

Her hand shook as she put the photograph back on the fridge. “Fuck. No way,” she whispered, and pivoted to see Mom’s laptop sitting open on the “work space” table that she and Frankie still used even though they could easily afford to put in a real home office.

Screw privacy. Brianna stormed over to the laptop, woke it up with a swipe over the touchpad, and saw--sure enough--a Pinterest board. It was full of pictures of table settings, floral arrangements, and a picture labeled “Wedding Decor Checklist.” Of course there was a fucking checklist. Of course--

Brianna sat down heavily in her mom’s chair and looked at the board’s title: _Finally._

“Business to the next level,” she breathed. “Goddamn it, Frankie.”

She heard thumping on the stairs: Mom and Frankie returning to tell Brianna what she already knew. Brianna should probably stand up, go back to the kitchen, and act like she’d never looked at the photo or the laptop, pretend she was still ignorant of something that--Mom was right--she should have figured out hella long ago. 

She sat still in the chair and kept staring at the laptop screen when the door opened, and Mom stepped in, mid-sentence. “--going to be awkward, but we have to explain--”

Brianna didn’t look up. Silence fell. She heard the door close. Frankie said, “I think we might have less to explain now.”

“I think we might have more,” Mom said tightly. “Brianna?”

Brianna leaned forward and looked at the Wedding Decor Checklist that promised to “help you nail every detail.” There were lots of details: _Welcome sign, guestbook, aisle runner…_

“Brianna?” Mom’s voice rose in agitation.

Frankie’s was much lower, even soothing, when she said, “C’mon, Grace. Let her process. Let’s go outside. Brianna, you know where to find us." 

Brianna did not reply. Their footsteps headed toward the deck, to the chairs and sofas that had hosted so many family gatherings over the last twenty-five years. Mom and Frankie sat there in all kinds of weather--not that San Diego had a lot of variety in that department. Even in November, it was temperate.

The door to the deck opened, and Brianna heard seagulls and the wash of waves on the shore. A light breeze blew into the room. The door didn’t close again.

Brianna looked at the laptop without seeing it. The memories were too loud in her head. For some reason, she heard herself ask Frankie yesterday, _Are you and Mom fighting again?_

She’d been asking that question for five years, with only a six-month break when Frankie had moved to Santa Fe, leaving Brianna’s mother to stare out of windows, not finish her salads, and stop drinking. Stop smiling. Lose weight she couldn’t afford to.

It wasn’t until Brianna threatened to make pink hair dye part of Say Grace’s lineup that Mom agreed to start returning Frankie’s calls. Brianna was never sure what happened after that, except that Mom started looking even more exhausted because “I was up all night on the phone,” and five months later Frankie was back in town with a sunburn and two U-Haul medium sized boxes of turquoise earrings.

And no Jacob. Nobody ever brought him up, because Frankie always looked sad and she shut down a little, and Mom’s face got pinched and she busied herself with straightening up whatever was closest to hand. That was nearly two years ago now. Everything had settled down and gone as close back to normal as Mom and Frankie ever got. Though she’d never admit it, Mallory had nearly cried with relief to see Mom with a vodka martini in hand.

Brianna heard voices coming from the deck. She glanced over to see the backs of Mom and Frankie’s heads as they sat...no, _reclined_ together on one of the two oversized chaise longues. Frankie’s head was tucked against Mom’s neck. Mom’s arm was around her shoulders.

The light breeze obscured some of what they were saying, but Brianna clearly caught Mom’s sharp voice saying, “...height of hypocrisy.”

“It won’t be like that,” Frankie replied, or at least that was what Brianna thought she heard.

Brianna slipped out of her shoes and tiptoed closer. Mom and Frankie weren’t looking back to check on her. They were just waiting. Maybe they were waiting for her to leave without a word. 

They should know better. When did Brianna ever do anything without a word?

When she got closer to the chaise longue, it was much easier to hear Mom ask, “Was it like this for them?”

“How do you mean?” Frankie asked.

Mom took a deep breath. “Caring, but not caring.”

“Caring about…” Frankie prompted gently, in the tone of somebody who already knew, but wanted the other party to spill it anyway. She’d had a lot of practice.

“About everybody else. About what would happen. You know. Caring, but not…”

“Not caring enough,” Frankie murmured. She rubbed her head a little against Mom’s shoulder. “It’ll be okay.”

“There’s always City Hall,” Mom said bitterly. 

Frankie sat up and glared at her. “City Hall doesn’t allow goats. I told you--” As she looked at Mom, she saw Brianna lurking from the corner of her eye, and jumped a little. “Jesus! What are you, a blonde ninja?”

Mom turned too, and her face was still. Her eyes were cold. But she’d squared her jaw and pressed her lips together, which meant that Grace Hanson was on the edge of her seat.

Brianna took a deep breath and folded her arms. “I know it’s just gonna kill you the first time somebody calls you copycats, so I’m getting it out of the way right now."

Mom’s breath left her in a soft rush. She relaxed, but Frankie scowled as she said, “We are not copycats! Tell me one thing we’re copycatting.”

“I just overheard it.”

Even Frankie seemed to have nothing to say to that. Brianna rounded the chaise longue and went for the loveseat that sat perpendicular to it.

She’d thought she was semi-braced for the conversation that was about to happen, but she still wasn’t quite prepared to see Mom and Frankie stretched out together on a chaise longue that was just big enough for both of them, Mom’s arm still around Frankie’s shoulders, Frankie’s hand resting on Mom’s thigh. They’d both crossed their ankles and their feet were touching.

Brianna exhaled. “So. Wow.”

“You okay with this, sweetheart?” Frankie asked.

“What if I’m not?”

“Then get fucked.”

Well, at least there was proof that Frankie hadn’t been bodysnatched by aliens. Brianna held up her hands. “I’m not _not_ okay. Relax. I just need to get used to it.”

“That’s fair,” Mom said cautiously. 

“You wanna take it from the top?”

“No,” Mom said. “The details aren’t--”

“It was a full moon. Pink Floyd was thick in the air. We got high and she kissed me,” Frankie said. “Then we made out for two hours.”

“Frankie!” Mom gasped.

“Right on that loveseat,” Frankie added, pointing at Brianna.

“Oh, God.” Mom’s head fell back and she looked up imploringly at the overcast sky.

“How does it feel to have your ass on sacred ground?” Frankie asked.

Brianna hesitated, glancing at the wicker armrest. “Depends. Did you go all the way?"

_“Brianna!”_

“Are you kidding?” Frankie said. “On that thing, with our joints? Plus, a storm was coming in. You know that aggravates her arthritis.”

“This isn’t happening,” Mom moaned. 

Wasn’t that supposed to be Brianna’s line? She said, “Then I can handle it,” though she still looked dubiously at the cushions she was sitting on.

“I’m not sure I can,” Mom said. “No more sex talk. From either of you.”

Brianna raised an eyebrow as she finally began to find sure footing. She crossed her legs. “You made your fortune with vibrators, and talking about sex is suddenly off the table?”

“When it’s _my_ sex and you’re _my_ daughter, then yes!” Mom wrinkled her nose. “Wait. You can’t really want to talk about it. You’re baiting us.”

“Baiting you,” Frankie corrected. She sat up and patted Mom’s thigh. “And she’s got a point. Brianna, would you like to hear about the ultimate intersection of our professional and personal lives?”

“No!” Brianna and Mom shrieked in unison. Frankie sat back against Mom with a shiteating grin. She curled up her legs and rolled on her side a little, snuggling in. Mom sighed and adjusted her own position automatically, easily, somebody who had done this a hundred times before.

“Where does Santa Monica fit into it?” Brianna asked. “I looked at the photo on the fridge. I mean, like I really looked at it.” _I see you._

For a second, Mom looked almost satisfied. Maybe that was why she actually answered. “We had a lot to think about. To talk about. We couldn’t do it with the possibility of some or all of you calling us or stopping by, so we got away for a couple of days.”

Brianna remembered Mom’s shy smile in the photo. “Must have been a pretty good talk.”

“Yeah.” Mom rested her cheek against the top of Frankie’s head. “It was.”

“Downright delightful at times,” Frankie said, and then “ow,” as Mom pinched her shoulder. Not hard, though.

“But that was half a year ago. You guys have been--” Brianna gestured at their bodies. “For this whole time? How did that even work?" 

“If your fathers managed it for twenty years,” Mom began before Frankie nudged her. She sighed. “Come on, Brianna. Are you really surprised we didn’t want to shout it from the rooftops?”

“Even I didn’t,” Frankie agreed. “And shouting from the rooftops is my fourth favorite activity.”

Brianna unpacked this. Yeah, okay. She could see why they’d want to keep it under wraps at first while they figured things out. Half a year seemed like a pretty long time, though, especially for something that would mark such a major change in their lives.

A really major change. With the highest stakes imaginable. If it hadn’t worked out...if they’d risked it all, started this, and then had to stop…

While the whole family watched and waited, holding their breaths…

Shit. It was amazing they were coming out at all. No wonder they’d held off until an actual wedding was in the works.

Brianna sighed and nodded. “Yeah. Well, at least we’re not all finding out after you’ve been married for a year and a day or something.”

Frankie and Mom looked at each other, and then glanced back at Brianna like two kids who’d just been caught sneaking out after curfew. “Ha ha,” Frankie said. “Like we would ever have thought about that. Ahahaha...ha.”

“Jesus,” Brianna muttered. “Well, if you do it in time, it’ll be a pretty sweet tax break.”

Frankie sat bolt upright and glared. “Brianna Hanson! That is not a consideration!”

Mom looked away and squirmed. Frankie turned on her. “Tell her, Grace!”

“Yes, Mom,” Brianna said sweetly. “Tell me.”

“Well,” Mom said, studying her fingernails, “it’s not _not_ a consideration.”

Frankie began to swell up like a pufferfish. Brianna rose to her feet. “I’ll be right back with your laptop,” she sing-songed, and sauntered back inside the house as she heard her mother mumble something about two birds, one stone, and how one bird was _much_ smaller than the other. 

They were gonna need more than the laptop out there. Brianna regretfully eyed the cooling pancakes as she swiped the bottle of champagne from the counter. She returned to the deck with the bottle in one hand and the computer in the other, in time to see her mother cup Frankie’s face and rub a thumb over her cheekbone.

“You can’t kiss your way out of this,” Frankie said mulishly.

“Oh yes I can,” Mom said, and Brianna immediately turned her back on the inevitable. She counted out eight seconds, and turned around just in time for Mom to be pulling away while Frankie beamed at her.

Nailed it.

She stepped back out on the deck and said, “Aisle runners suck,” as she dropped the computer into her mother’s lap. Then she popped the cork.

Mom frowned down at the screen while Frankie peeped over her shoulder. “I wasn’t going to do those. No way I’m walking across the ground in my high heels.”

“We can do it barefoot!” Frankie said. “With only the grass under our feet. In touch with Mother Earth.”

Instead of going back inside for glasses, Brianna took a swig straight from the bottle, not caring when the bubbles went over her chin and dripped down onto her blouse. Then she offered the bottle to Mom, who made a scandalized noise, but accepted it anyway and raised it to her own mouth.

“Hey,” Frankie said, “don’t hog the hooch.”

Mom slugged back the champagne, managing not to spill anything. Then she gasped, “There’s not enough hooch in the world to make me get married barefoot.”

“I’ll compromise on the goats. I can see how you wouldn’t want to walk through goat poop in your bare feet. See?” Frankie took the bottle. “I can be reasonable.”

“No bare feet,” Mom said, sounding a lot less certain as Frankie took a drink.

Brianna pulled out her phone. Mom said urgently, “No, Brianna, we want to tell people ourselves. Please wait.”

“I’m not calling or texting anybody. I’m making a note so we can get a spot with your pedicurist whenever you guys nail down the date. Oh, hey. You guys need to nail down the date.” She glanced up from her phone. They were staring at her. “So...how about you do that right now?”

“The winter solstice,” Frankie said at once.

“No, we-- _barefoot?_ On the winter solstice?”

“Love keeps you warm, Grace."

“Love gives you frostbite.” Mom turned back to Brianna, even as her arm went back around her intended’s shoulders.

“Please tell me you’re writing your own vows,” Brianna said, already mesmerized by the thought.

If she’d expected a replay of Sol and Dad’s dilemma, she was disappointed: “Of course we are,” Mom said simply.

“I’ve been practicing mine on my phone,” Frankie said. “You’ll have to watch and give me feedback. I currently have forty-seven recordings. Don’t worry,” she added before Brianna could object. “The longest one is only fifteen minutes.”

Brianna turned to her mother. “You have my solemn promise that Frankie’s wedding vows will come in under three minutes.”

“Three minutes!” Frankie said. “I demand seven.”

“Let’s aim for five,” Mom said. “Brianna...thank you.”

“You should. I came all the way out here and now the pancakes are cold.” Brianna waggled her eyebrows. “You disappoint me, Bride 2 Be.”

Frankie laughed and clapped in delight. Mom ducked her head, blushing. They pressed closer to each other.

Goddamn.

“Right,” Brianna said, her thumbs poised over the screen. She wished she’d known to bring her iPad. “You got me here, so use me. I’m ready to start writing stuff down.”

**FIN.**

 

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